Editor’s Note: This article first appeared in the January editions of Corporate Counsel and The American Lawyer as “Transformation, Not Automation.” A tech-centric companion piece focusing on the decade ahead will run on LTN tomorrow.

The year is 2030. The fight at the top of the Am Law rankings is between divisions of Deloitte and EY. Many lawyers work from home because local and state courts have largely moved online. Artificial intelligence has made contract drafting and review near non-existent; most new lawyers are fine with that anyway, because they came out of law school with AI certifications.